


Solace

by DreamingOfABetterYou



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Cuddling & Snuggling, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Not Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, Steve Rogers Gets a Hug, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, post Bucky's cryo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-26
Updated: 2020-09-26
Packaged: 2021-03-08 04:13:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26669512
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DreamingOfABetterYou/pseuds/DreamingOfABetterYou
Summary: “You’re awake?” Steve muttered as he approached the bed and toed off his trainers on the way, leaving them for Bucky to surely trip over the next morning. Bucky rose from his lying position on the bed and shuffled closer to Steve on his knees until he could take him in his arms, kissing him hello gently and carefully.“I wanted to wait until you came back” he replied, stroking Steve’s bearded cheek with a tender thumb as he looked him over thoroughly. “To make sure you were alright.”_____________Bucky comforts Steve after a taxing mission.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Comments: 7
Kudos: 98





	Solace

**Author's Note:**

> Hello friends,
> 
> this is my first time writing for this particular ship, and I have to say my goodness do I enjoy their dynamic! Knowing me, there's loads more to come :D  
> Have a lovely day!
> 
> Love, Liz x

Bucky’s eyes shot up from his book when he heard the apartment door open and click back into the lock only a moment later. However, his heartbeat calmed near-instantly as familiar footsteps came closer to the bedroom. “Take off your shoes, punk” he growled quietly to himself even as he smiled. He had only just dog-eared the page (it drove some people insane to see him do it; the fact that Sam was one of them, sadly, wasn’t a deterrent of such behaviour at all), when the door quietly swung open to reveal Steve’s tired face.

“You’re awake?” he muttered as he approached the bed and toed off his trainers on the way, leaving them for Bucky to surely trip over the next morning. Bucky rose from his lying position on the bed and shuffled closer to Steve on his knees until he could take him in his arms, kissing him hello gently and carefully.

“I wanted to wait until you came back” he replied, stroking Steve’s bearded cheek with a tender thumb as he looked him over thoroughly. “To make sure you were alright.”

The specific hurt of Steve’s last big mission before this one was still present in Bucky’s chest. He had found out that Steve had broken his leg weeks after it had originally occurred, only because he had been asleep when Steve had limped in that night, with the serum already starting to fuse the bone back together during the night. From the way Steve ducked his head slightly, bumping their noses together apologetically, the wound didn’t only smart Bucky. It had been their worst fight in years, possibly, second only to the screaming match over Bucky’s decision to go back into cryo four years ago.

“Just a few scrapes, Buck, really” Steve assured him; he had a quite long scratch near his collarbone, revealed by the neckline of his shirt – he must have showered on the plane, if his damp hair, fresh clothes and general suspicious cleanliness were to go by. When Bucky touched careful fingertips to the wound, the scabs readily fell away to reveal pink, fresh skin. It would be unnoticeable in about twenty minutes.

As glad as he was to see his boyfriend without any blood on him, Bucky still frowned, running a hand through Steve’s hair, firm enough to tip his head back a bit, just the way he liked.

“You’re shaking” he stated; it was impossible to miss even with the way Steve’s hands had clawed into the material of Bucky’s henley – the man was all but vibrating against his front.

Steve’s eyes clouded over with grief, and he visibly struggled to heave in his next breath, aided by Bucky’s quickly-placed palm on his chest. “I-“ he choked out, “I couldn’t…”

“Come here” Bucky soothed, readily pulling the blond into his arms, bracing Steve’s weight when the taller man went practically boneless in his embrace. He pulled Steve forward until the other man took the clue and climbed on the bed as well – a bit awkwardly, considering he still had his face tucked against Bucky’s neck. A whine escaped him when Bucky slowly maneuvered them onto their sides, quickly smothered when the other man kissed his temple and stroked his hair.

“Shh, sweetheart, I’m here. Turn around for me, hm?” he prompted, knowing that Steve did much better with talking when they weren’t face to face, that he took a special kind of comfort in feeling Bucky snuggled tightly against his back. The blond clumsily tipped onto his other side and let himself be gathered back against Bucky’s chest, their bodies flush together from shoulder to toe. The brunet slung his flesh arm around Steve’s waist, very much unsurprised when his fingers were instantly sandwiched by two giant hands. He curved himself even tighter against Steve’s back, letting the other man feel his presence, and pressed quiet kisses against the nape of his neck as Steve proceeded to settle further and further into his touches.

“Do you remember when we used to do this back in our old place?” he murmured softly, lips nearly touching Steve’s ear. The blond nodded after a moment, running his thumb over the back of Bucky’s hand.

“The heating didn’t work, but your hands were always so warm” he replied, voice still carrying a bit of wonder – even after everything that had happened, the idea that they could share memories from the Thirties, almost ninety years after they had occurred, was slightly unbelievable.

Bucky chuckled. “Compared to your icicles, maybe” he taunted, playfully raking his teeth over Steve’s neck and relishing in his affronted sputter. It was a long way away from where they had started, nearly five years ago, when Bucky had been absolutely terrified to see Steve readily settling into his embrace. Literally turning his back on him, his soft throat on direct display.

_“Steve” Bucky had warned quietly, his voice trembling so much he could barely get that one word out. Immediately, Steve had whipped around in his arms, blue eyes searching his face for any sign of distress. “What is it, darlin’?” “I could choke you. Crush your throat” Bucky had confessed, eyes wide at his own audacity; he had wanted to clench his eyes shut in shame at seeing Steve’s face twist with heartbreak so quickly, but he couldn’t._ The Asset must keep eyes on target at all times _echoed in his head. Steve had breathed out of his nose slowly. Calmly. The man had to be insane. “But you won’t, will you?” he had near-whispered, hand twitching in an apparent desire to reach out and touch, but holding himself back. “I…I don’t know” Bucky had replied, terrified of how true that sentence was. “I don’t want to hurt you” he had tried out, and hadn’t hated the taste of those words on his tongue. Steve’s smile had been as golden as a thousand sunrises in July. “And I don’t think you will.”_

_(They barely cuddled as they slept in that time; with Bucky refusing to be at Steve’s back, and Steve running much hotter than normal humans, it was just inconvenient. The last of the few times Steve spooned Bucky – usually an occurrence after an especially taxing day – he had been woken up in the middle of the night to find Bucky cowering over him, hand curved around a hunting knife, inches away from slipping between Steve’s ribs; Steve had tightened his arms around Bucky in his sleep and the other man had believed himself to be back in the chair at HYDRA. No amount of soothing or assurances could possibly console the other man._

_The very next morning, barely past dawn, Bucky asked to see Shuri. He went into cryo the day after, unmoved by Steve’s pleas and assurances that they’d figure it out in any other way.)_

Bucky kissed Steve’s pulse point softly, chasing the dark memories away with a subtle shake of his head, strands of dark hair which had started escaping his ponytail tickling his skin.

“Everyone on the team okay?” he asked gingerly, hoping to avoid any conversational landmines. It should have been a relatively easy mission – maybe deceptively so?

Steve hummed uncommittedly, shuffling in place a bit to better fall into the cradle provided by Bucky’s outstretched metal arm meeting the curve of his shoulder. “We barely even needed medical on the plane” he replied after a moment of silence, clearly still stuck on another part of the mission. “How was your day?”

Bucky sighed silently at the deflection, but answered anyway. “Not too bad; caught up on some paperwork, had an early dinner with Nat, read a bit. And then you walked in.”

“Looking like a million bucks?” Steve asked faux-hopefully; his tone fell a bit flat.

“Do you want to tell me what happened today, or not?” Bucky gave back, his tone soft but decisive.

He felt Steve breathe in deeply, felt his lungs expanding under his hands, his fingers twitching between his own, and buried his nose in Steve’s hair, making a questioning sound.

“It’s…it’s not getting easier” Steve started slowly. “And I guess that’s a good thing. I don’t want to go on a mission one day and not _care_ anymore. I think…I think that might kill me.”

Bucky nodded, knowing Steve would feel it; he felt Steve’s heartbeat reverberating in his chest, almost like it was his own.

“There was a man. Thirties, probably. He…I…The building came down more quickly than the team had anticipated. There was dust everywhere, and sprinklers to combat the small fires on the ground floor, and smoke. I wanted to help him to the door, he couldn’t really see, and…” Steve broke off, curving into himself like he was protecting his soft spots from the outside. Bucky followed suit, taking care not to crowd him too much.

“There was a massive boulder coming down right next to us, I should have seen it, but I didn’t notice. It hit him hard, and he went down. By the time I had lifted the stone off him, his legs and hips were completely crushed. I carried him outside, but he…” he drew in a shaking breath, his voice brittle and delicate with grief. ”I’m not sure he’ll make it. If so, he’ll never walk again.”

Bucky hummed as Steve shivered, feeling the blonde’s fingers flex in clear muscle memory of what had occurred.

“I know I can’t save everyone” Steve admitted stubbornly, clearly replaying what his SHIELD-recommended therapist and members of his team had been telling him again and again. “I know that. But…” His voice carried off into nothing; clearly embarrassed of his thought process, he had caught himself before finishing the sentence.

“But if you wouldn’t try, you wouldn’t be yourself” Bucky finished for him, no trace of doubt in his low voice.

Steve froze in his arms, and then released what sounded like the biggest breath he had taken all goddamn week. (It sounded too much like a sob in Bucky’s ears, but he’d take what he could get.) The blond man turned around in Bucky’s embrace until they were face to face, Steve’s massive hands tucked between them just below their chins, and Bucky’s flesh arm rubbing expansive strokes up and down Steve’s spine.

“Hello there” Bucky greeted him warmly, leaning their foreheads together for only a short moment.

“I…did you mean that?” Steve asked, voice brittle; his eyes were dark and suspiciously shiny.

“You’re still the boy I fell in love with, Steve” Bucky replied matter-of-factly. “Always ready for a fight if somebody needed someone to step up for them. Your heart has always been open for whatever came your way, and that’s hasn’t changed. I’m glad, Stevie, that the world hasn’t made you cold.”

“You didn’t sign up for this” Steve muttered with a furrowed brow, “having to talk me down like it’s my first stunt whenever it gets tough.”

“Nonsense” Bucky tutted, smoothing out the lines on Steve’s forehead with slow rubs of his thumb. “I knew what I was getting into right from the start, with you. We didn’t know what would happen, we couldn’t have known. But back when you were that scrawny little punk looking to beat up fellas who were harassing some dames, I already knew. I always knew that I’d be with you.”

“To the end of the line?” Steve mumbled carefully, corner of his mouth lifting in a small attempt of a smile.

Bucky cradled the other man’s jaw in his palm, stroking his eyebrow with his thumb softly.

“To the end of the line.”

Steve’s smile broadened; it was still wobbly, and not as sunny as Bucky would have liked, but it was _him_ , and that was enough. The blonde turned his head to kiss Bucky’s palm, losing eye contact for a moment as his eyes shut before he turned back to him, gazes locking.

“I love you” he breathed, kissing Bucky with terrifying gentleness, one hand delicately cupping Bucky’s chin.

“Well, yea” Bucky said quietly when they broke apart, “that’s what I just said.”


End file.
